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P.J. O'Rourke

Why I hate the beach

The sun shone brightly, like I give a crap. The O’Rourkes possess the Hibernian complexion best suited to sitting in dimly lit pubs – a result of millennia of Darwinian selection among Hibernians sitting in dimly lit pubs. We were coated inch-thick in sunscreen, SPF 100,000.

Posted at the entrance to the beach were the red-circle-diagonal-slash “prohibited” signs that have replaced the spread eagle as the symbol of the American republic. “No littering,” “no smoking,” “no cooking,” “no camping,” “no dogs,” “no glass containers,” “no alcohol,” “no bonfires.” I would have added “no photographs of meditative politicians walking on the shore” with a slash though a silhouette of JFK.

No alcohol or bonfires? I have a fuzzy memory of fondness for the beach when I was young. The fuzziness was from the beer we drank after building bonfires in the dunes in the middle of the night. This beach in Massachusetts closed at 7:30 PM, and beneath the beach prohibitions was another sign reading, “No Dunes.”

This last was simply a lie. There were dunes all around us. I consulted my wife who had spent two weeks Googling “beach” to make sure we had enough beach stuff to carry to the beach from the beach parking lot.

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I remember a beach vacation in Georgia during my childhood, in which the sand and water weren’t so bad, but the area had some rather large bugs flying around and biting us.

What if you’d never seen or heard of a beach and someone suggested you spend your holiday at a place where there’s a large, hot, windy expanse of ground-up stones, the grit from which coat your hair and exposed flesh, get under all your clothes, and penetrate your every bodily orifice?

Not only all of that, but it can stay in you suitcase for a long time afterwards.

He should have brought his family to Texas where the water is warm and one can drive on the beach. But then again, he would have had to put up with all of us “Tea Party Riff Raff” down in this part of the country. 😉

Try knocking off a piece on the beach. Things get gritty fast. It was Dania beach, 12:30 AM, the gal I was with was smoking hawt and wanted to do it on the beach before she had to go back to NY city. Well, all went well till the drunk stumbled in behind me and proceeded to give coaching advice ala Foster Brooks style. I’ve had many fond memories of beach life, but that one wasn’t one of them.

Yeah, we picked up and moved to park under the bridge and completed our mission.

What if you’d never seen or heard of a beach and someone suggested you spend your holiday at a place where there’s a large, hot, windy expanse of ground-up stones, the grit from which coat your hair and exposed flesh, get under all your clothes, and penetrate your every bodily orifice?

Now I was always told by the evolutionists.. the reason people go to the beach is because we all came from the ocean. It was our way of staying connected to our creator.

What if you’d never seen or heard of a beach and someone suggested you spend your holiday at a place where there’s a large, hot, windy expanse of ground-up stones, the grit from which coat your hair and exposed flesh, get under all your clothes, and penetrate your every bodily orifice?

We do all those things on our beach in Port Aransas. It’s so much fun!

pullingmyhairout on July 27, 2014 at 10:19 PM

I went to Port A this year. I liked the trip, but holy hell does the beach smell terrible. I mean all beaches stink, I get that, but wow that beach smelled like an open sewer. Which in a way, that is kinda what the ocean is.

I used to live in Phoenix. It’s nothin’ but beach for five hundred miles around. And no pain-in-the-butt ocean to interfere with one’s enjoyment of the 10^20 particles of sand. And if you go out far enough into it, you can be far from the stench of h. sapiens (sic!) and their little rules.

See, thing about the ocean (and I’ve seen my share of ’em) is once you get to it, all you can basically do is stare out at it and say, “yep, that’s the ocean all right.” Unless you’re a surfer or a yachtsman, there’s not a lot to do there. You can swim out a very short distance, at your peril. One mistake and you are literally over your head. And there are all kinds of critters in there that see every other critter as dinner, h. sapiens (so called) not excepted. And a sting from a manta ray or jellyfish has been described as less than pleasant, from what I’ve read.

In the desert, there’s no limit. Point your 4WD towards the horizon and go. Of course, there are nasty critters in the desert too, but you can generally see them coming from a distance if you keep your eyes open.

I live in a country made up of 7,107 islands.
Consequently, there are beaches everywhere.
Yet most Filipinos don’t often go to the beach, because they don’t want to get darker.
Sadly, it’s part of the cultural mindset that only light-colored skin is considered attractive.
So most of the incredibly beautiful beaches are often quite empty.

Exception: Boracay, which is crowded because that’s where the international tourists go.

My husband took our family
To spend a day beside the sea.
We brought umbrella, towels and spade,
I sat with Kindle in the shade.
The sultry air was still and dense.
The shade offered no recompense.
I listened to the siren’s song
And wandered through the noisy throng.
My charming husband took my hand,
Together waded out from land.
We rushed up hillocks, down in dells
With foaming waves we rose and fell.
We splashed and played in manner grand,
A lovely, weightless waterland.
While bobbing, we were sun-kissed apples,
But I, now blind from sparkling dapples,
Turned to go back to the shore,
Fatigued, refreshed, I sought no more.
My brief and buoyant levity,
Soon rediscovered gravity.
Sunk deep in sand, ah, but the sea,
The sea had other plans for me.
The sea in whose arms I was thrall
Rolled me like a bowling ball
Knocking down some kiddie pins,
Up to the shore ass over chin.
And out again and in twice more
I nearly drowned upon the shore.
And there I sat all inside out,
My nether regions filled with grout.
The slack-jawed stares on children’s faces
Said they’d seen my lady places.
And then my husband ran to me,
And pulled my shorts up past my knees.
With bruised esteem high on a shelf,
I deprecated on myself.
One day, some enterprising rube
Will prob’ly post it on YouTube,
And I shall need a web redemption,
For Daniel Tosh makes no exemptions.

I love ya PJ, but I love the beach. Of course I go to beaches in the south as the Lord intended. The water is warm, the sand is white, I have my sunscreen on and I can walk for miles and watch the water and sand and just have a wonderful time. The only downside is when I wade in the water, the fishes nibble my toes. But I look on it as a free pedicure.

Just on the chance that you don’t know much about P.J. and he seems like a total whiner (and he is) he likes to test drive cars and those articles are a hoot. Of course he might not do that anymore now that he is married with children.

Yeah, the beach. About that. Ick. I don’t like taking a bath with all those people around, either. Cut my leg open on a broken beer bottle in in shallow water as a child. I was told by my best friend in fourth grade that I couldn’t be an airline stewardess because of the scar. She was just being helpful. *eye roll* And, they don’t tell you that bikinis are worthless in the waves for swimming, unless you get off on flashing people. I don’t tan, anyway. Nothing or burn. And, don’t get me started on sand, just ick, and those creepers, lying face down, grinding disgustingly into their towels as girls walk by… Ick, ick, ick. I hate the beach. How much am I paying for this session?

Try knocking off a piece on the beach. Things get gritty fast. It was Dania beach, 12:30 AM, the gal I was with was smoking hawt and wanted to do it on the beach before she had to go back to NY city. Well, all went well till the drunk stumbled in behind me and proceeded to give coaching advice ala Foster Brooks style. I’ve had many fond memories of beach life, but that one wasn’t one of them.

Yeah, we picked up and moved to park under the bridge and completed our mission.

44Magnum on July 27, 2014 at 10:20 PM

One Monday morning my chemistry prof cussed the entire class the first few minutes (Spring of 1974) because someone had broken into his small beach camp (we call them camps in LOuisiana) at Dung (teen slang name due cows running on the beach) Beach in SW Louisiana, ONLY to use a bed. “Why cannot you do it on the beach like when my generation was young? A little grit never hurt anything.” with a few #$&#*## thrown in for good measure. Ah the days when PC wasn’t in style.

We do all those things on our beach in Port Aransas. It’s so much fun!

pullingmyhairout on July 27, 2014 at 10:19 PM

I went to Port A this year. I liked the trip, but holy hell does the beach smell terrible. I mean all beaches stink, I get that, but wow that beach smelled like an open sewer. Which in a way, that is kinda what the ocean is.

Ars Moriendi on July 27, 2014 at 11:05 PM

The smell is the rotting seaweed. I guess I’m just used to it because I live here. On the cleared areas of the beach, they scrape it into the dunes. It is a natural way to maintain them. On less populated parts of the beach, they just let it be.

The best “beach” time in Port A is from late September to February. The seaweed is gone and the water is clear. Glad you enjoyed your trip. 🙂

Maybe give Ocean Isle beach in NC a try? It’s a rarity, even compared to other NC beaches. Very beautiful, clean, quiet. I’ve gone there nearly every year since I was four years old and it’s still my favorite place to be. If I could live there, I absolutely would (although the insurance would be horrific).

Also, why would his children be blistered by the sun at all in the age of spray on sunscreen? It’s a godsend.